


500 Hand Written Letters

by arianapeterson19



Series: Avengers Shorts [12]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Abandonment Issues, Clint Is a Good Bro, Cookies, Fluff and Angst, Homecoming, Insecure Tony, Letters, M/M, Manipulative Nick Fury, Nightmares, Sleepy Cuddles, Some Fluff, Steve is a good boyfriend, Tony Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-12
Updated: 2015-11-12
Packaged: 2018-05-01 08:38:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5199365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arianapeterson19/pseuds/arianapeterson19
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Every single letter ended the same - Love Always, Steve.<br/>Every one of them. Tony thought it would stop after he didn't answer the first 100. He was wrong.</p>
<p>Or</p>
<p>Steve has an extended mission and Tony doesn't take it well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	500 Hand Written Letters

“Then leave if you’re going to go!” shouted Tony and Steve had to wonder – not for the first time – if the billionaire even knew he was crying.

 

“Tony, please,” begged Steve. “I know this is hard but it won’t be for long.”

 

“I’m not stupid, Steve,” growled Tony, swiping at the tears streaming down his flushed cheeks. “I know it’s not forever. Just go.”

 

Tony turned his back on the super soldier, back to his work. Steve sighed. He knew he had messed up. He promised Tony the last time he was sent off on an extended mission that it would be the last time, that he would stop taking missions that lasted more than three weeks, but then someone caught wind of an extensive section of Hyrda that would take months to dismantle and Steve couldn’t pass it up.

 

“I’ll see you when I get back,” said Steve softly.

 

Then he left the workshop.

 

That had been sixteen months, twelve days, eleven hours, twenty-seven minutes, and six seconds ago – not that Tony was counting. The mission wasn’t supposed to be longer than six months. Tony knew he had been petty to be mad at Steve for leaving; of course he was going to go save the world, it’s what he did, but Tony had foolishly believed that the man really would stay.

 

Steve sent letters daily. Some were long, others short scribbled notes saying he was safe, he was sorry, and he loved Tony. Sometimes he included pictures or drawings. Tony never responded. He read every single letter, kept all 499 of them, but he never responded. He couldn’t respond. He wasn’t sure what would happen if he wrote back, he just knew that his heart wouldn’t be able to take it if he wrote back and then suddenly lost Steve again.

 

Somehow Steve seemed to understand if his letters were any indication. The first twenty eight were dedicated to apologizing for not talking to Tony about it before, to telling the billionaire that he knew he was mad and he deserved it. The next hundred and six were all about how much Steve missed him and everything he promised to do for Tony when he got back. After that Steve spent his letters telling Tony about what he was seeing – the parts he could mention – and things that reminded him of Tony. Not a single letter, no matter how many passed, were angry or spiteful at Tony for not responding. One letter even mentioned it – the four hundred and thirty-fourth letter – mentioned how Steve knew Tony was reading them and it was okay that he didn’t respond, he was sure Tony would have more than enough to say when he got back.

 

“Hey Tony,” said Clint from the living room of the mansion.

 

“You are one of the worst conversation starters I have ever met,” replied Tony, shaking the snow off his sleeves before removing his coat and toeing off his boots. “Try starting with something more original, like ‘Today I harvested a colony of purple bees and hand fed them to the Loch Ness Monster.’ That would be better.”

 

“But I did that yesterday,” whined Clint, throwing Tony a smile over the back of the couch.

 

“Mail arrive yet?” asked Tony, trying to keep the eagerness out of his voice and failing miserably. Fortunately Clint had the good grace not to point that out.

 

“Yup. I put it on the counter in the kitchen.”

 

Walking into the kitchen, Tony’s nostrils were assaulted by the smell of holiday cookies but his eyes were drawn to the pile of letters splayed across the countertop. It made him happy in the deep dark hidden part of his mind to see the mess on the counter, knowing that it would have driven his parents batty had they been alive to see it. He knew it was petty to still think such things good but he was Tony Stark and he didn’t care.

 

There wasn’t a letter.

 

Today was the 500th day of Steve being gone and there wasn’t a letter waiting for Tony. It didn’t make any sense. Even on days when there was no post delivery like Sunday’s and holidays, there was still a letter. Steve always found a way to send him a letter (Tony was fairly certain the assassin twins were in on it and probably Bruce). Yet no matter how many times Tony filed through the mail, no letter appeared slipped between the bills and useless advertisements.

 

“Hey Clint,” called Tony, hoping that maybe the archer had taken his letter and hidden it as a prank (even though no such thing had ever happened before because everyone knew what those letters meant to Tony).

 

“Now who’s the poor conversation starter?” laughed Clint.

 

Tony sighed as the oven behind him beeped, indicating that the cookies were finished baking. He couldn’t bring himself to look away from the mail in vain hope that somehow, someway, his letter would appear, because the only reason Steve wouldn’t send him on would be if he really couldn’t, if he-

 

“Oven’s beeping,” yelled Clint. “Someone should get the cookies out.”

 

“Get them yourself, you lazy idiot,” yelled Natasha from somewhere down the hall, most likely the study. “You’re the one who insisted on baking cookies.”

 

“Bruce wanted them too!”

 

“Don’t drag me into this,” said Bruce from the library while the oven continued to beep.

 

“I’ll get it,” sighed Steve.

 

Tony whirled around to see Steve standing near the oven, his duffle bag at his feet, a sheepish smile on his face.

 

“You came back,” whispered Tony, more shock in his tone than he had intended but he couldn’t be bothered to feel ashamed.

 

“Sorry it took so long,” said Steve.

 

Tony shook his head, unsure if he wanted to laugh, cry, punch his idiot boyfriend or run away. In the end, he settled for sinking to the ground, knees to his chest, head down, shaking with emotions he couldn’t quite handle. But that was okay, because the next moment Steve was on the ground next to him, pulling the smaller man into his arms and not saying a word, just letting the genius catch up with his emotions.

 

“You didn’t send a letter,” Tony choked out petulantly thirteen minutes later.

 

Silently Steve handed him an envelope with his name on it before going back to holding Tony; the billionaire was allowing it but not holding Steve back.

 

It wasn’t a hand written letter like Tony had come to expect. It was typed and official and it said a bunch of words but the ones Tony zeroed in on were too important to notice the others.

 

“This assures that I won’t be sent out for longer than six weeks,” whispered Steve. “I can’t stop taking missions – I would go crazy – but now I can officially promise to never be gone so long.”

 

“You missed everything,” whispered Tony and again, Steve had to wonder if the genius was aware of the tears tracking down his cheeks.

 

“I missed you too,” replied Steve because he knew that was as close as Tony was going to get to admitting he missed Steve.

 

For several long minutes they sat like that, Tony more in Steve’s lap than out of it, Steve content to hold the genius on the cool tile of the kitchen floor while the cookies burned in the oven.

 

“Oh for the love of all that is good and holy, could you not take out the damn cookies instead of just turning off the timer?” declared Clint, marching into the kitchen when the smell of crisping cookies reached him in the living room. “Seriously – Steve! You’re back!”

 

“Hello,” said Steve with a tired smile.

 

“Steve’s back?” said Natasha, poking her head around the corner. “Thank goodness. Maybe now Tony will sleep through the night and not keep the rest of us up.”

 

Tony turned his face against Steve’s neck, daring to flip Natasha off from the safety of Steve’s arms.

 

“Nightmares?” whispered Steve, regret clear in his voice.

 

Tony didn’t dignify that with a response.

 

“I’m going to go shower and then take a nap,” declared Steve. “When I am done I am expecting cookies that aren’t burnt, Clint.”

 

“I’m not the one who burned them!” said Clint, unable to actually sound mad when he was so happy to have Steve back.

 

“We’ll make more,” assured Bruce, giving Steve a hand up and hugging the soldier. “Good to have you back. We’ve missed you. Tony especially.”

 

“Good to be back,” said Steve, just as quietly.

 

Tony followed Steve out of the room, looking heartbreakingly like a lost puppy and close to panic if he got too far away from the super soldier, as if that distance meant it was all a lie and that Steve could disappear again.

 

“I’m going to kill Fury if he ever tries to pull a stunt like that again,” said Natasha softly when they were sure Tony and Steve were upstairs. “That was just cruel, keeping Steve away on stupid missions with the promise that he would sign that dumb paper.”

 

“Why did he finally sign the paper?” asked Bruce, taking out a fresh bowl to make more cookie dough.

 

“I may have had a little accident with an arrow that resulted in a long chat with a captive audience,” said Clint.

 

Everyone turned and stared at the archer in surprise.

 

“What?” said Clint defensively. “If I had to look at Tony seeming so lost and sad much longer I would have gone insane.”

 

-Break-

 

Tony curled up on the bed, asleep for almost an hour before he suddenly woke up to yet another nightmare.

 

“Hey, you’re okay,” said Steve soothingly, pulling Tony closer and holding him. “It was just a dream. You’re fine.”

 

“You’re still here,” said Tony, shocked eyes turning on Steve. “I thought that was just a dream.”

 

Steve smiled sadly back at him, heart aching with the knowledge that Tony had woken up more than once thinking Steve was home only to find it not true.

 

“I’m here now,” whispered Steve.

 

“But you’re leaving again,” said Tony. “Everyone always leaves.”

 

“But I always come back,” whispered Steve, kissing the top of Tony’s head. “Always.”

 

“You wrote me letters,” said Tony.

 

“I have one last one,” said Steve, sitting up slightly and pulling an envelope out of his pocket. “I know that other one doesn’t really count since I didn’t write it. So here.”

 

Tony took the envelope and tore it open, sitting up cross legged in the bed.

 

_Will you marry me?_

**Author's Note:**

> I was watching homecoming videos and I had to write something.....this was not what I intended.  
> Always,  
> Ari


End file.
